Hafod Goes Green with Cemwood

Over 1000 planks of Cembrit’s Cemwood have been used on a recently finished housing project for Hafod Housing Association in Bridgend, South Wales. Built to comply with Code Level 4 for Sustainable Homes, the development, Cae Gleision, features thirty one properties in a mixture of houses, flats and bungalows. Cemwood, is used as façade cladding on some properties and helped the project reach Code 4 Status due to it being a long-lasting alternative to traditional timber cladding, offering hard wearing performance and fire resistance.

The Code for Sustainable Homes was introduced in 2007, with new social housing in England, Wales and Northern Ireland having to be built to Code level 3. The Code works by awarding new homes a star rating from one to six based on their energy efficiency and sustainability. Cae Gleision is one of the first Hafod Housing Association projects to be built to meet the requirements of Level 4 for the Code.

This project also boasts the completion of two dwellings built to meet the standards of the Passivhaus Institute, which were awarded recently with Passivhaus certificates. Cemwood was used as feature panels on these properties.

Steve James, Director of Holbrook Construction, the design and build contractors for the project, commented: “As this was a Code Level 4 project, we chose the product for its green credentials. Cemwood is rot proof and makes a durable finish which doesn’t need to be treated as aggressively as timber. Furthermore it is relatively simple to cut and install, we found it easy to touch up to remove any site blemishes, providing an excellent contrast to the brickwork.”

Paul Mantle, Maintenance Manager for Hafod Housing Association added ‘Cemwood provides us with the ideal combination of aesthetics and low maintenance. Traditional timber cladding requires regular treatment to maintain in good order, which is disruptive to the residents and costly to the Association, and from a health and safety perspective, requires operatives to work at height which is best avoided.’

Cemwood is a wood effect cladding designed to replicate the look of traditional timber whilst retaining the aesthetic appeal of real wood. It is a long-lasting replacement to worn out timber planks or artificial looking plastic cladding. Cemwood has a textured appearance and can be supplied in grey for on-site painting or staining, or it can be supplied pre coloured to further save on site construction time. Pre-coloured boards are available in a wide choice (any RAL colour) with most shades guaranteed for colour stability. Cemwood is unaffected by heat or sunlight, something that can limit the colours available in plastic cladding. This combination gives low lifecycle costs and reduced maintenance bills.